


My Dear Doctor

by apliddell



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Banter, Established Johnlock, Established Relationship, Flirting, Fluff, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Mild Angst, Sick Fic, The dying detective, culverton smith - Freeform, technically they're working a case together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 17:08:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13299366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apliddell/pseuds/apliddell
Summary: After the painful events of the Reichenbach Fall, Holmes could never again deceive Watson into thinking he would lose him.





	My Dear Doctor

I was half-dozing on the divan, a book at my nose, when I stirred to hear the step of my friend upon the stair. The door burst open, a rather disreputable looking seaman swirled past me into the bedroom, and a moment later, Holmes joined me in the sitting room, wrapped in his dressing gown and wearing his heavy house slippers. 

 

“Good evening, Watson, good evening,” Holmes went and stood before the fire, then stoked it up with the poker to make it blaze, “I have been down the docks all day, and I believe I may never be warm again. How the cold does soak into one’s bones after a certain age. Talking of which, turn over onto your other side, there’s a good fellow. You’ll be up with that shoulder half the night, I daresay. You must have a hot water bottle, or I shall be able to do nothing with you in the morning. Do you suppose Mrs Hudson might send up a little hot supper if you rung for it?”

 

“If  _ I  _ rung for it?” I raised an eyebrow and lifted my book meaningly. 

 

Holmes chuckled, “I beg your pardon; you are engaged. I don’t suppose stepping away from this fire for a moment will turn me into quite an icicle.” 

 

“I shall be at your service in an instant if it does.” Holmes laughed too generously at my joke, and I got up to ring the bell. 

 

“My gallant preserver,” said my friend warmly, clapping a hand to his breast. 

 

“Perhaps you can be prevailed upon to read to me, in recompense for tearing me away from my excellent book,” I regained my place on the divan, taking care to lie on the side that did not house the Jezail bullet I’d carried home as a souvenir of my campaign in Afghanistan. 

 

Holmes bowed, “I stand ready to be commanded.” The maid entered with just the hot supper Holmes had hoped for. He went to the table to avail himself of it and beckoned me to follow him. 

 

“Ahhh, that is better,” remarked Holmes a quarter of an hour later, as he poured out his second cup of tea. “One cannot be properly warm when one is hungry, so it seems. Anything to that, Doctor?” 

 

“One cannot be easy when one is hungry, certainly. Are you feeling warmer now?” 

 

“Much more comfortable, my dear, thank you,” Holmes stretched luxuriantly. “You wanted some reading doing, did you not? Or were you only reading to put yourself to sleep?”

 

“It does not much matter to me,” I told him. “Let us go back to your fire and see what fancy strikes us.” Holmes nodded agreeably and rose from his seat. I took his armchair while he warmed himself at the hearth, and when he turned to find me in it, he only shrugged up his shoulders and perched himself on my knee.

 

Holmes put an arm about my neck, “Do tell me if I put too much weight on your shoulder. Has it been paining you today?”

 

“Not particularly,” I said, shrugging it experimentally. “Why do you mention my shoulder so often?”

 

“I see from your left coat sleeve that you have not put your nose over the threshold all day, and I thought perhaps you had been nursing a little stiffness in it--the shoulder my dear and not the nose--as we have had such beastly rain all day, and I know it does sometimes make your shoulder ache. Lying on it all night and reading won’t help, will it, John?” 

 

“Do not call me my Christian name when you are scolding. You are not my mother.” My friend laughed so heartily that I could not help a smile either. “Tell me about my left coat sleeve.”

 

“You turned the sleeve inside out when you removed your coat when we got in last night. You have not had occasion to put your coat on since then, or the sleeve would not still be so.” 

 

I nodded, “Ah, of course. My shoulder is fine. I was only too busy idling to go anywhere. Oh by the by, you have had a parcel today. I put it on your desk.” 

 

Holmes raised his eyebrows, “Have I indeed? How interesting. Any return address?”

 

“None. Were you expecting it?”

 

“I was certainly expecting something. One moment, if you’ll excuse me.” Holmes rose and went to the bedroom. He came back wearing a heavy pair of gloves and with a handkerchief tied round his nose and mouth. “Watson, have we-ah! The coal scuttle. Excuse me.” Holmes collected his parcel, a paper knife, and the sugar tongs, then went and knelt on the hearth. He upended the coal scuttle on the hearthrug. 

 

“My dear Holmes, think of the carpet!” 

 

“I hope we shall survive worse than a little soot,” said Holmes absently as he delicately cut away the paper and string wrapped about the parcel to reveal a pretty little ivory box. He lowered the box into the coal scuttle and eased it open with his paper knife. Something dark popped out of the box and fell with a small clink into the bottom of the coal scuttle. Holmes picked it up with the sugar tongs and looked closely at it. 

 

I slid down from my seat onto the floor next to him for a closer look at the thing. It appeared to be only a bit of spring, scraped sharp enough to break the skin at one end. “What is it?” I asked, “Some absurd practical joke?”

 

“This is no laughing matter, Watson,” replied Holmes grimly. “It’s murder. Cold-blooded murder.” 

 

“Well go on, old boy, don’t stop there. Those stories are really going to your head; you have grown so theatrical.”

 

Holmes gave a little sigh as he put the spring back into the box and shut it carefully, “You are so terrifically helpful in the stories, Watson. Could you not say ‘Holmes, you astonish me!’ or something of the kind? It is very encouraging.”

 

I smiled, “First you’ve got to say you liked A Study in Scarlet.” 

 

“Never!” 

 

“Then I expect you are encouraged enough without my romantical, unscientific fawning.”

 

“You needn’t have put all that in about the desert and so forth; it was quite exciting enough without.”

 

“If you want me to tell it like a textbook, then so ought you to tell it like a textbook. How did the little box try and murder you?” 

 

Holmes looked a little sulky over the top of his handkerchief, “It’s only Culverton Smith trying to infect me with Tapanuli fever by means of this sharp spring. Rather insulting, is it not? He knows I’ve found him out about Victor Savage, and he still imagines he can take me in like this? What are the criminal classes coming to these days?” 

 

“A grievous insult,” I agreed, getting to my feet. “Shall we get up from the floor?”

 

Holmes reached for his Persian slipper and began to pack his pipe, “Keep still for a bit, will you? I must have a little think.” And he lit his pipe and stretched out on the floor, puffing at it from under the handkerchief. There he laid for nearly an hour. 

 

…  
  


I was prodded awake in the hours before dawn, and when I blinked my eyes open, Holmes was standing at my bedside with a candle, “What is it, darling?” I asked blearily, “A murder or a nightmare?”

 

“Sorry to knock you up, old man,” said my friend earnestly. “Only I must speak to you. Make a little room? Ah, yes, perfect.” Holmes climbed into my bed next to me and blew out the candle. 

 

“I do not believe you have ever been sorry to knock me up,” said I with a tremendous yawn. 

 

“You think so ill of me,” Holmes said mournfully, kicking off his slippers under the bedclothes and finding my calves with his cold toes. 

 

“I believe you have been out of bed all night. That won’t do, Holmes, but I shall have to have a word with you on the subject after the sun rises, and I’m in proper working order. Do tell me what you want and let me go back to sleep.”

 

“I am here to apply for your help,” Holmes told me rather seriously. 

 

“I am at your service,” I answered, trying to look into his face, though it was too dark to see his features. 

 

I think he nodded, “Thank you, Watson. I do warn you. You won’t like it.” I kept silent, waiting for him to continue. “I have been thinking over this Culverton Smith business, and I have decided that I must have a little death.”

 

I smiled, “Must you indeed? Goodness. I do call it indefinisible to wake me at this hour for such a trifle, Holmes. Surely you could-”

 

“Thank you, Watson. Such a privilege to be the whetstone upon which you sharpen your wit. Will you hear my plan, or must I tell it you over your breakfast and risk being drowned out by ham and eggs?”

 

“Now don’t sulk, my dear.” I leaned toward him in the dark and bumped my nose against his cheek, and it did well enough for a kiss of apology, “It was not quite the thing to make a joke at such a moment; I do apologise. Tell me everything. I am all attention.”

 

“That rascal Smith thinks he has done me in with his paltry spring trick. Would it not be as well to let him think it?” I could hear the note of excitement in Holmes’ voice, though I could not see the gleam in his sharp, grey eyes. 

 

I did not answer straight away, “For how long?”

 

“Only a little while,” said Holmes eagerly. “Not quite dead, in fact. At death’s door, and then if you would be good enough, you might do a little pleading on my account, and get him to run over to Baker Street and save my life. Of course the last thing he will want is to save me, once he has got me nice and murdered, but he may like to do a little death bed gloating, and then we have him, Watson!”

 

“Hum,” said I, rather ungraciously. “Too many of your plans depend upon your supposed demise. It will get about that you cannot actually be killed, and then where will you be?”

 

Holmes was very still for a moment, and when he spoke again, his tone was subdued, “I have not even reached the bit you won’t like.” 

 

“As I say, I am all attention.”

 

“If I cannot get him to confess, it will be that much more time squandered, and he will slip even further out of my nets.”

 

“Mmm,” I concurred. 

 

“Then you agree the part must be acted to perfection, or there is no point in doing the thing at all.”

 

I pinched the bridge of my nose, “Never mind about convincing me, and just tell me plainly what it is you want to do.” 

 

“A trifle,” said Holmes with false carelessness. “A few days without bread and water should do the trick.”

 

I sighed, “Holmes. Can you expect me, as your medical advisor, to accede to such a plan?”

 

My friend found my hand in the bedclothes and pressed it, “I daresay you are rather more than my medical advisor, John.” 

 

I pressed back and was grateful for the darkness that hid my helpless grin, “And so you think you can do whatever you like with me, because I am,” I paused to find my words.

 

“Because you are my dearest and most loving friend, and you trust me,” Holmes twined his arm about mine and rested his head on my shoulder. “And because you know as well as I that a few days of privation to bring such a person to justice are indeed only a trifle.”

 

“You think too little of your own well-being,” I answered, stroking the thin arm curled through mine. “I cannot stop you, of course.”

 

“No, you cannot, though it is not such a nice thing to say that I would splash it about like rainwater,” Holmes replied primly. 

 

“Of course I will help you. I will always help you, Sherlock.” He made no answer, but only sighed deeply and pressed my hand again. “You must let me set a few conditions.”

 

“I suppose I cannot call that unfair.”

 

“You must let me nurse you, and you must take as much rest as I tell you to.” 

 

“My dear Watson, I shall be on my deathbed!”

 

“No correspondence,” I continued, taking no notice. “No composing, no chemical experiments. You must have water, as it is quite literally beyond human endurance to go without for three days. And if I say you have grown too ill to continue, you must allow for my medical judgment and do as I tell you.”

 

From the pause that followed, it was clear that Holmes wanted to argue, “All right. I accept.”

 

“And you must let me take you away to the country for complete rest after it is all through.”

 

“After the Assizes, surely!”

 

“After the Assizes.” 

 

“‘How dull it is to pause,’” said Holmes plaintively. 

 

“You will not rust unburnished for a few days fishing and rambling, Sherlock. Do we have a bargain?” 

 

“I am sure I would do anything you asked me to.”

 

“You are as mild as a lamb, my dear. I have always said so.” 

 

My friend laughed and laughed and clutched my shoulder for support, until I could not help grinning along with him, “Here now, Watson. You are in the habit of making me far too noisy for the hour. I shall go back to my room, put on my makeup, and get into bed. Do look in on me after your breakfast, and deplore my sickly looks and lack of appetite.” I felt his long, graceful hand on my cheek for just a moment, before he sprang out of my bed and was gone without another word. 

…  
  


I had a rather leisurely breakfast, taking care to tut with Mrs Hudson over my friend’s absence from the breakfast table. After I’d finished my meal, I found my way into Holmes’ bedroom. He was a rather pathetic sight, huddled under his blanket, a sheen of sweat glistening on his brow, his keen grey eyes unnaturally bright. His eyelashes fluttered when I entered, and he shrank down into his bedding with a shiver. 

 

“Shut the door, will you, Watson?” croaked my friend. “You’ve let in the most dreadful draught with you.”

 

“Poor old Holmes,” said I cheerfully, though it was hard to look at him in the midst of such apparent misery and remain unmoved. 

 

“Shut the door,” was his fretful reply. I did so, and he sat up, with a little of his usual mischief about the mouth, “A little respect for my deathbed, if you don’t mind, Watson. No whistling over my corpse, now.”

 

I raised my eyes to the ceiling, “Good heavens, Holmes! What a thing to say.” I approached his bed and cupped his cheek, with a little sigh of relief to find it quite cool. His pulse, too, was steady and showed no unhealthy increase. 

 

“The play’s the thing, my man. If you’re going to do my pleading for me, you’ve really got to plead. Have you got it in you?”

 

“Could I beg for your life?” I raised my hand to his cheek again and pushed away the memory of a certain cliffside. “I daresay I could.” 

 

My friend coloured and lowered his chin to his chest. After many moments of silence, he replied in tones of deepest mortification, “I have asked too much. Forgive me. I must think of another plan.” 

 

“No, no,” I said gently. “I promised you my help, and I will give it as best I can.” My companion did not answer, but his eyes seemed to grow even brighter. “Perhaps a little token to bolster my fortitude? A kiss?” His colour rose even higher. He smiled bashfully and one hand went unconsciously to his mussed hair. I took his hand and kissed first his palm and then his still half-smiling mouth. My friend sighed through his nose and held my face gently in his long, graceful hands. 

 

He held me even after the kiss broke, so that when he spoke again, our breath mingled. “Ah, there is something so nourishing in these little caresses, John,” said my companion dreamily.  

 

“Then I must feed you on a diet of tenderness, if you will take nothing else.” 

 

My friend renewed the kiss briefly, then sank back onto his pillows, “When I am being trying, you respond with stunning goodness and care. However long I love you, I am sure I shall never get your limits, John Watson.”

 

For all his kind and affectionate spirit, my friend’s references to his deeper feelings for me generally came in hints and allusions and to hear him speak so openly of his love and see his keen, clever features so plainly softened by the influence of his great heart moved me deeply. It was some moments until I could reply, “Being yours is my greatest joy. I am glad I can reflect a little of it back to you, my love.” 

 

My friend wrapped his arms about my waist and laid his head on my chest, and so entwined, we sat in intimate silence for a long time. 

 

...

 

When I looked in on Holmes the next morning, he was even more sickly, his complexion livid, his lips crusted, his eyes unnaturally bright. Though he seemed to have found the strength to pull his bed out from the wall, leaving a space deep enough for a man to crouch in, should the need arise. 

 

I rang for tea and sat with him to be sure he drank it, “Surely we can call this the crisis, Holmes.”

 

Holmes shook his head and set aside his cup, “Tapanuli fever runs its course over three days, Watson. Friend Smith is as craven as he is heartless, and he must be convinced he is hissing his foul secrets into an expiring ear, or he will never confess to his crimes. If he suspected I had the strength or the time-”

 

“Drink your tea,” I interrupted. 

 

Holmes sipped meekly, “It is not real, Watson.”

 

“I shall never be used to you chatting so comfortably about your own murder. It is downright ghoulish, Holmes.” 

 

“The haunting shall be finished tomorrow evening,” Holmes sipped again and pressed my hand. 

 

I cupped his hand between mine, “You use yourself up too freely, old man. You are more than a bucket of rain water to pour yourself over criminals and put them out.”

 

Holmes answered me lightly, “Such a way with words, you have, Watson. If you had not already taken to chronicling my little efforts, I would certainly feel the absence.”

 

I understood that I had been rebuffed, but though it was not my custom to press him where he withdrew, I could not let the matter lie, “It is painful to me to see you underrate the value of your life so casually. It is not nothing to me.” 

 

My friend averted his eyes, though within the cradle of my hands, his fingers curled more tightly, “You are an old soldier Watson, and so do I also have my battlefield. I suspect we had long made peace with our respective inevitably perpendicular ends before we ever laid eyes on each other.”

 

“And yet you threatened a man’s life because he shot a hole in my trousers.”

 

Holmes shrugged up his shoulders, “‘Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself.’”

 

“Because you love me.”

 

My friend smiled, “Yes, because of that.”

 

“Well then!”

 

My companion clapped a hand to his heart, “A touch, Watson! A positive touch.”

 

I laughed, “I am not trying to defeat you with rhetoric, you silly ass! I am imploring you to look after yourself a bit better and acknowledge that your health means something to me.”

 

“Because you love me.”

 

“Yes, because of that.”

 

My friend made a little sigh of resolution and leaned his head against my shoulder, “Well then.”

 

…

  
  


“Where shall we go on our complete rest, Watson?” Holmes asked, sitting up in bed the next morning when I brought him his tea.

 

I sat down on the edge of his bed, “This is a change, my dear.”

 

“Ah well, three days without food, and I am putty in your hands. Where shall we go? I am getting to like having you always at my elbow, though you do fuss and fidget me so,” Holmes had not yet renewed his little theatrical touches of rouge and beeswax and belladonna, so that he looked almost himself, though weak and tired from want of food. 

 

I smiled at the compliment dressed in pettishness, “A relation of mine has a cottage to let in Cornwall. I might write and take it. I understand it is a very secluded spot. Excellent for convalescence.” 

 

My companion shut his eyes and hummed a soft note of pleased anticipation. 

 

My smile widened, “We might visit my friend Colonel Hayter in Surrey. Very picturesque spot. Good fishing, I believe.”

 

Holmes creased his brow a little, “A visit. Pah. Nothing restful in that. Go back to the seclusion.” 

 

“We might return to the continent. I passed some very lovely days with you in Switzerland, and it seemed greatly to agree with you.” Holmes opened his eyes and looked at me in some surprise then. “When I could bring myself to think of it,” I said, answering his look. “After I had lost you, I thought that time as near as I would get in this world to perfect happiness.”

 

A flicker of some strong emotion passed over my friend’s face, “And now?”

 

I kissed his hand, “And now I have you back, and we can attempt perfect happiness as often as we like.”

 

Holmes seemed struck by the idea. He shut his eyes again and brought my hand to his breast, stroking it, as if its presence soothed or strengthened him, “Perfect happiness. Indeed.”

 

…   
  


“He will not want to see you,” Holmes warned me, his hands dancing nervously on his coverlet. “Force your way in, if you must, but once he knows your errand, he will be eager enough to pay me a call. Do not let him come with you. Make any excuse you must to arrive-”

 

“Before him, yes. I do remember the plan, my dear fellow. Are you sure you will not take a biscuit? It will ease your nerves to have a little something in you.”

 

Holmes waved away the ginger biscuit I offered him, “Nerves? I assure you, I am quite at ease.” 

 

“Mmm,” I raised an eyebrow at his twitching hands. 

 

“Getting into character, Watson. Must do the thing properly. Are you sure we shouldn’t have the bit about the oysters?”

 

I shook my head, “If he thinks you are too delirious to understand him, he will not bother tormenting you by boasting of his evil deeds.” 

 

Holmes nodded, “True, very true. Is the box arranged, Watson?”

 

“It is there on the dresser. Can you not see it?”

 

“Ah yes, there it is. Bring it forward a bit so that he will… carefully now, don’t open it. Yes, excellent. Good old Watson. Raise the blind, will you? Thank you. Lestrade down there yet?”

 

I looked out of the window, “Yes, and two plainclothesmen.” 

 

“Excellent, excellent. My stage is set. If you will have the goodness to fetch my antagonist, we may begin our little drama.” 

 

“Of course. I will be back within an hour.”

 

“Thank you, John. Ah, one last thing. Turn down the gas.” 

 

…

 

“Ah, thank you, Watson. I never needed it more,” said Holmes, helping himself to a biscuit. “No tea, thank you. I am rather weary of it at the moment, but have we any of that claret remaining? Thank you. And you will take some yourself? You look a little careworn, if you will excuse my saying so.”

 

“Perfectly all right, Holmes, thank you. But I will take a drop of claret,” I poured out two glasses for us and waited until Holmes turned to me from his toilet to offer him one. 

 

Holmes raised his glass to me, “To your health, my dear.”

 

I smiled and raised my own glass, “And yours.” We drank, “Shall I come with you to the police station?”

 

“If your patience will extend so far, Watson. Your testimony may be of use to Lestrade. And then I think a little something at Simpson’s would not go amiss.”

 

“It certainly would not,” I agreed. “It is good to put this nasty business behind us, Holmes.”

 

“I could not be more delighted to have finished it, and I never could have done it without you. Are there any points about the case upon which you still require clarification?”

 

“Bother the case, Holmes. We can talk of that later. I’m only eager to get that stuffed game cock in front of you.” 

 

“Trust you to hasten the return of my beauty,” Holmes said with a gay laugh. “Talking of which, have you written yet to your Cornish relations?”

 

“Have we settled on Cornwall, then? I have not written yet, but I shall at once, if you wish it.”

 

“Do, my dear doctor! By all means, write straight away.”

 

“Certainly, I shall.”

 

“Thank you, John,” said my friend, coming to where I sat on his bed to drape an arm about my neck, “I do believe that some weeks of solitude and fresh air will be just the thing for us to begin to try and author a little more of that perfect happiness. Wouldn’t you agree?” 


End file.
